As someone rightly said, “You are just one decision away from a totally different life”, for me that decision was attending a workshop on Blue Prism, something that was out of my line of work at that time. A simple journey that made my journey as a Btech Electronics and Communications Engineer from a small college in Jaipur to a Senior Developer at Fidelity International (P.S Financial status change included :P).
The Lost Beginning – From where it all started
While graduating? from JECRC University three years ago, I was quite proud of what I had achieved there. A topper of my batch and a stable job at Ericsson India Global Services, Gurgaon. As a person who had never stepped foot out of Jaipur, staying alone in Gurgaon and making a mark by my hard work and dedication in my very first job is something I always pat my back for. I was working as a Site Engineer at that time, playing with Excels and other documenting tools to provide a telecom solution to our clients. For my professional growth, I focused in the Networking Domain as the next milestone and got myself CCNA Certified. My managers were happy with what all I had achieved in such short time and had great expectations from me. But I was not satisfied with what I was doing, something was missing. I had understood by that time, that Networking and Site Engineering is not something that makes my passion. As every new beginner in the industry, I was still looking out for my passion and areas of interest.
Will I ever find my Passion?
After working for around 7 months in the industry, I had quite figured it out that this is not something that I wanted to continue. But then, I was not even sure what I wanted to do, was it even something in technical domain? I tried learning coding languages like Java and python but learning that from scratch without and prior Computer Science knowledge was not sounding feasible to me. I was also exploring options in higher education, MBA, GMAT what not.
The spark of my new Beginning
And then during all this chaos, my manager in order to keep me motivated, nominated me for a “Robotics Process Automation Using Blue Prism” Training. Just after reading the title, I was not that interested. Being from Electronics background, I thought it will be some hardware related training. But just to keep my manager pleased, I attended it anyways.
The training was organized by an external trainer from Accenture. Much to my surprise, it was a software training in which I realized what my mind has a knack for. It opened me up to a technology that allows anyone to configure computer software, emulate and integrate the automation of human interaction to execute a business process. RPA robots utilize the user interface to capture data and manipulate applications just like humans do. They interpret, trigger responses and communicate with other systems in order to perform on a vast variety of repetitive tasks. Only substantially better: an RPA software robot never sleeps and makes zero mistakes. And all about this amazing technology what I learnt about that day was via Blue Prism. It was Blue Prism and its extremely user-friendly and easy to use UI that helped me grasp even the very minute details to the technology with great ease. It gave me a confidence, that anything that you can imagine, can almost be achieved via technology.
Getting caught by the Right Eyes
But my very belief was challenged right within the few hours of learning about RPA. The trainer had declared that a particular process could not be automated using Blue Prism as it is too complex. Rattled by this statement, I refused to change my beliefs and rather questioned the trainer on her surety. I didn’t go for my lunch break that day, instead I just sat in the training room, trying to solve that very problem. And alas, I had indeed figured out the solution. While working on the solution, I was observed by a very senior person, who was also a part of the training with me. And when the trainer entered the room again, I was ready to present her with my solution. And that indeed left her and all other attendees startled. It was after the training I realized that the senior person was no other than the Automation Head of Gurgaon Site. I was so amazed to see my interest and thought process that he gave me the opportunity to change my professional course.
I was within a week pulled off from my department and aligned directly with him. Together we started the beginning of RPA and Blue Prism in Ericsson Gurgaon. I delivered around 11 bots in my time there.
But the feeling of my First Bot being delivered for Production and seeing it live in the client’s system is an irreplaceable one. It is something I never forget and that keeps me going to achieve what I dream.
Taking the Road Less Taken
Being one of the pioneers in this technology in my company, I didn’t quite know how good my knowledge is, and what other things are there to learn in RPA and Blue Prism. So along with delivering new bots and maintaining the live ones, I studied more about it. Went through various blogs, tried interacting with RPA Professionals from other Companies. I took it upon me to complete the learning path that I started and cleared the Blue Prism Certified Developer and Blue Prism Professional Developer. All my dedication to the technology was also acknowledged by Ericsson’s Impact and Automation Awards.
Exploring Other Options – A change of Domain
After pretty much exhausting my growth opportunities in Ericsson, I finally decided it was time to move on and take a bigger challenge. I then switched to Publicis Sapient, as an Associate Technology L2. The team, technology, challenges and opportunities, everything was three times more than what I was exposed in Ericsson. Working in the Advertisement Domain gave me an intense knowledge of the Industry from a very different perspective. I learned to integrate OCR with RPA and other challenging and new technologies. How this all can be integrated with each other to provide a single end to end solution or pipeline. Apart from Blue Prism, I learned several other tools too that implemented RPA. This short time of 6 months in Publicis is what gave me a great understanding of how and what are the aspects of RPA industry and what all various other solutions for RPA are available in the market. I also got the opportunity of participating and winning in many Hackathons. I was also awarded a special Award in Vegas for winning in a National Level Hackathon.
Following the Path that Started It All
After having the knowledge and using almost every solution available in market, I still feel that Blue Prism is the most useful and accommodative solution present:
- The user-friendly UI,
- integration with other tools and technology,
- ease of usage,
- ease of learning
- and extent of automation
These are just a few of the points that kept me drawing towards it for all problems. That was the very reason, I switched to where I am today, Fidelity International, as a Senior Process Optimization and Simplification Developer. Here I got to work in the most exciting domain of all, Investment Mangers. I openly admit that it has also been the most challenging domain to work with, provided its extent of importance and volatility. Here I am again working extensively on process automation using Blue Prism. In a very short time, the company has accepted me with open heart and given me a position of great importance. The work culture is very open, allowing every resource a platform to raise their voices. My reporting is to a person who is working in UK and most my interactions are offshore. There is so much to learn from their way to working and interactions. I have had the chance to improve even the internal processes of the company using Blue Prism here.
Due to my extensive achievements in a very short span of time, I was also given the opportunity to judge hackathons. Most commendable one being the Smart India Hackathon – 2020
It is here in Fidelity where I got the chance to directly interact with the Blue Prism Community. It is great to interact with them and learn more. And the best part what I feel about it being their open attitude towards suggestions and improvements. Blue Prism is taking this learning even to college students via it’s Learn-A-Thon initiative
A Note to Takeaway
Looking back to my journey of three years, I always regard my Blue Prism Training to be the most important milestone that changed the course of my journey and has got me where I am today. It is Blue Prism’s simplicity and ease that has kept me attached to it even now.
“You never know what’s around the corner. It could be everything, or it could be nothing. You keep putting one foot in front of the other, and then one day you look back and you’ve climbed a mountain”. Blue Prism and RPA have been the base of my mountain!
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